Bambina Bon Mots: Part 155

Bambina has been in rare form these days. She wears me out, but it's a fun way to get exhausted. She has a small stuffed dog named Meyer. He is the love of her life. She got him as a baby and he looks every day as old as the two years of "love" to which he's been subjected. The other day during Quiet Time she told me that she was Meyer's mommy and I was his daddy. I asked her if that meant we were married (wow, I'm so traditional...). She looked at me like I was a moron: "Yeeeeesss, Mama. We married." So I asked her whether we've been married a long time, what flowers were at our wedding, etc. (A long time, purple flowers). Then I asked, "So where did we get married, my love?," expecting "park" or "garden" or "temple" or something. Her answer?

"The Home Depot."

I haven't laughed that hard in a very long time.

Then yesterday she was regaling us at lunch with the shabbat songs she learned at preschool. It's a pretty simple ditty: "Shabbat Shalom (clap!), Shabbat Shalom (clap!)...etc). It's a pretty common tune so we started singing and clapping along with her. Instantly she turned into Debbie Allen from Fame ("Fame costs. And this is where you start payin'. In sweat."). She stood up in the chair, held her hands out with arms at full length and said really loudly, "Everybody stop! You singing it wrong! I show you how!"
We all just fell out laughing, like we'd been called out by a reality show judge who just can't listen to one more note of our atrocious amateur singing. Yup. America voted, and we're being sent home.

Where's Paula Abdul when you need her?

I'm Sticking With Fortune Cookies

I somehow got on the list for two separate daily horoscopes many years ago. I have an email address that I use only for online purchasing, so obviously it was as a result of something I bought. Usually they just fill up the inbox and I delete them all every two months when I get around to it. I've just been too lazy to click on that unsubscribe link, I suppose.

With little else to do this week I decided to read them.

Astrology site #1 for June 28:
You need to get away from home to give yourself some space to think things through. An opportunity to make more money may be possible if you are ready to make a move. Someone you live with may object to your plans. You think?

Astrology site #2 for June 28:
It's time for you to decelerate. Give yourself permission to lie around the house, couch surf and indulge in some strictly-for-fun reading. There's nothing as nice as a bit of lazy time spent on yourself.

So which is it, astral seers? Get away from home or sit around watching SportsCenter with a beer? Obviously I think the people over at #2 have more of a sense of where I am these days, but don't these people coordinate their astrological advice?

Of course, I was finding it all very funny until I got this:
You're glowing with confidence, and no one (least of all that certain someone) can resist you when you're in a mood like this. Why not throw a party and gather your nearest and dearest together? The more the merrier.

I'll get right on that. Just as soon as I hit *delete*.

Sexy Toddler Chic

From The Arizona Republic by way of consumerist.com:

GapKids recently featured a white, crocheted string bikini you'd likely see Anna Kournikova wearing on the cover of the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue. The bikini was for a 12-month-old. Racks at Target held several bathing suits perfect for a Hawaiian Tropic bikini competition. The crocheted and camouflage-designed suits started at Size 4 in the little girls' section. Inseams on "classic" shorts at stores such as Abercrombie Kids and Hollister Co. are microscopic. And halter tops, shirts often lauded by fashion consultants for their ability to enhance a less-than-voluptuous chest, are everywhere for every age. Moms hoping to find anything even mildly modest have to be happy Bermuda shorts are trendy again.

How disturbing is that? What "parents" would put their kid in a string bikini? I'm all for slutting it up if you're the one making the fashion call for yourself. Have at it, high schoolers, if that's what you want to sell. But to dress your toddler in a crocheted string bikini? What next? Toddler pasties? Little boy g-strings?

I remember being a kid and running around the beach naked. In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find a single photo of me on a beach before age 4 (and after 23... hee hee) with any clothes on at all. Honestly, I find that to be more natural and less frightening than dressing a kid suggestively. A naked baby is a naked baby. A toddler in Maxim-worthy gear is twelve ways not right. This whole story just creeps me out, perhaps less because the clothes exist and more because there are actual parents buying them. I guess we can just await the next big reality show: America's Sexiest Toddler, which is (as the Book of Revelation clearly outlines) a sign of the coming apocalypse.

Welcome, Gordo.

Ya big Scotsman!


Here is an online chat with Brown over at the Belfast Telegraph. I like how he answers (or doesn't answer) questions, from Iraq to global warming to "How many Scottish people in the Cabinet is too many?" God forbid the United Kingdom have a cabinet that represents ALL of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, huh? Why hasn't anyone wondered over the past several hundred years how many English people in the UK cabinet is too many?
Belfast Telegraph

Anyway, I digress. It's official. Gordon Brown, Scotsman, Prime Minister of Britain.

A Little Bit Country, A Little Bit Rock and Roll

Had my clinic visit today. I felt like hell, yesterday and today. I had a pretty high fever last night--bad. But it was back to normal by this AM--good. Which means that I obviously have some white cell action goin' on. But I was hurtin' most of yesterday.

Which brings us to today's clinic visit. Today at the clinic was my big day to get my chimerism testing done. We'll find out the results next week. What's a chimera? For all the non-X Files fans out there? A Chimera in genetics is defined as a single animal organism with genetically distinct cells from two different zygotes. As you may have surmised from all of my screeds regarding donor stem cells, I am currently a chimera. Some parts of my body reflect my own DNA, some others reflect the DNA of my donor. (Do I have any special crime opportunities as a result of this, I wonder?)

So how did we find ourselves so soon at this august moment of chimeritude? Simply put, the whole marathon that is a stem cell transplant can be broken down, for practical reasons, into 6 stages.
Stage 1. Do Not Get Infection Before Transplant.
Stage 2. Survive the chemotherapy regimen (via minimal infections, fevers and reactions)
Stage 3. Day +13ish, see if your counts are coming up. If they do, your donor's cells have engrafted. You're on your way! If they don't, see your doctor for advice.
Stage 4. Chimerism testing. Test what percent of the DNA in your blood cells is donor vs. recipient. You want it to be 100% donor. If it's more like 50/50 "then we need to strategize what we're going to do about that," said my doctor, not filling me with any sense that even 75/25 would not be a complete disaster.
Stage 5. Assuming you were summa chimera laude, feel glad. Then watch for the next 6 months for any sign of the dire Graft Versus Host Disease.
Stage 6. Assuming you were out that day when GVHD dropped by, celebrate your one year anniversary. Begin plans to get your immunizations. Start allowing yourself to dream of having a normal life. Meet your donor and buy her a drink. Meet your friends again! Meet their kids born last year! Thank God that you and your miscellaneous DNA lived to tell. Now go buy shoes and cosmetics and worry about the price tag later. After all, you've already spent a million-plus becoming the spokesperson for Chimeras R Us (a role that denies you the wearing of cosmetics and the public places in which to unveil your fantastic footwear); you might as well splurge a little bit for Jimmy Choo and Shu Uemura.

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*Wee serious note: If you are inclined to offer thoughts, wishes or whatnot for people with any kind of belief that such offerings may have an effect of any positive kind, I'm going to offer my support for said thoughts and wishes....blah blah blah...what I'm saying is that I really really need my chimerism test to be as close to 100% as possible. Otherwise, I'm a bit reluctant to hear the "other options" available, one of which might involve doing the chemo/transplant thing again, which I don't need to tell you is so very really desperately exceedingly not something I want to relive. My deal is this: I'll do all the bargaining with God if you do all the genuine, real-stuff praying. Between the two of us, I can't see us getting less than a B-. :)

Enough About Me; Now Back To Me

I just got dinged via email by a couple of people worried about me because I haven't posted much recently; and what I have posted has not been about my health progress.

Would you believe I've been way too busy to blog? Too many meetings and lunches and evening get-togethers to find my way to my computer?

Didn't think so.

As hard as it is to believe, I think I started to bore myself with...myself. Which therefore must mean that someone who is not me must be positively over this whole topic, desperate for some other subject matter, and completely content to spend the rest of their days sans insight into my GI issues. And who could blame them?

But, just as the whole class is "rewarded" when those two kids ask moronic questions with five minutes left to go in the class, you will now be treated to more Adventures In E's Immune System courtesy of the email dingers.

Short story long: I'm fine. Eating better, mostly feeling better. Still dawg-tired. I'm having major psychological issues with the fact that I can neither floss nor brush my teeth till my platelets are 50,000. I have these little green foam-on-a-stick things that I have to use, but when was the last time foam got some toast out of your front teeth? I was an avid flosser pre-transplant, so the lack of between-teeth hygiene is completely wigging me out; more even than the non-shaving of the legs and the inability to groom the eyebrows that have now gone to an appalling state of nature. It's a good thing I'm blond, is all I can say, or I'd be a shoo-in for the Brezhnev lookalike contest. It's horrifying, but certainly less so than not having flossed for almost a month.

I raised the issue with my doctor (who I am adoring more every day as he gets more comfortable and funny around me). He's the head of the transplant program and--not for nothing--he has the lowest infection rate in the country for transplant patients. How does he keep these numbers so low? Because he's strict and he don't care about your wah-wah-I-need-to-floss drama. He said, "when your platelets are 50K, you can floss again." I countered with, "But I flossed all the way up to being admitted here!" He looked horrified. "Are you serious? Well then you are a very lucky young lady because that was dangerous. With your low white count and your lack of platelets you could have given yourself a massive blood infection, and those tend to not turn out very well." Then he waved his hand at me and said with a sort-of humorous shiver, "Don't tell me anymore about it! That is frightening." Apparently, plaque is bacteria. And flossing can cause microscopic nicks in your gums. Into which the plaque goes. From which you can get a mouth/gum or blood infection if you don't have the immune system to stop it. Who knew!?? I was living on the edge all that time, courtesy of Oral B.

Undeterred by his shock, I circled my way back to the "can I floss now since my white count is getting really good these days?" He repeated in the style that I do with Bambina where you are being really matter-of-fact and on-message because you don't want to have to repeat yourself again: "when your platelets are 50K, you can floss again." Still convinced of the absolute necessity of flossing, I was about to try another tack to get him to give me the nod on flossing when he said (again, like he was talking to a willful toddler. Which I suppose he was), "How about I just tell YOU when you can floss so you don't have to ask again?" I started laughing and said, "Fair enough. Point taken."

So that's where I am. I ate a pickle for the first time the other night. It tasted so awesome. The next morning wasn't such a dill-y of a time (Ba-doom-boom!), but eating it was worth the drama. Mostly I eat vegetable samosas, naan, chicken soup, and cornflakes with banana. That's pretty much my repertoire. Oh--and potatoes. Of course. My whole appetite seems to have shifted. I used to love zone bars, balance bars, all of those meal-replacement things. I literally can't even look at the packages now. I loved pizza, any kind, the greasier the better. Now it has to be a very particular type of Trader Joes frozen. I loved Diet Coke. I can barely even type "diet coke" now. I never imagined I'd be eating samosas and naan for lunch and dinner, but if it works, it works.

So that's the update. Thank you for staying after class for a few moments to get the info. Now you can go steal those kids' lunch money.

The WSJ Editorial Board Needs A Vacation Day

Today's WSJ editorial "Paid Not To Work" predicts widespread employee vacation day fraud if paid leave is passed in New Jersey. That's their opinion, and they are certainly entitled to offer it on their OpEd pages. But if you read the article further, they jump from saying that paid leave is too expensive for employers to offer, to saying that leave of any kind (including your usual run-of-the-mill vacation days)will be a burden on conscientious employees because companies will become more vigilant about policing time off.

The most telling aspect of this editorial is the use of the term "...has documented many cases where..." You and I both know that if the WSJ has the numbers, the WSJ uses them. So when they say that "Verizon...has documented many cases where employees claimed illness but were discovered to have traveled to Disney World" or "manufacturers have reported many instances where workers claimed leave in order to take vacation days..." Why the nebulous quantity, WSJ? What precisely does Verizon mean by "many"? Like, 100 out of a hundred thousand? That's not very compelling at all, is it?

And why the beef with people getting time off? The US already works more hours weekly and yearly than hundreds of other countries. And let's talk about the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993. It is UNPAID leave. Yes, a wonderful and welcome option for those who can just stay off work for 6 weeks and not collect a paycheck. But how many people--not including those who work for the WSJ, of course--can realistically do that? It's a wonderful benefit that only the already-lucky can use. And you think it's only malingerers and lazy workers who use it? How do you think I was driven to Boston, settled in and taken care of for a couple of weeks pre- and during transplant, with no worries about Bambina's daily needs being met? By someone punching a clock from 9-5? Not likely. It was specifically the FMLA that made that possible, albeit without salary.

But what about those who can't meet the mortgage without a weekly paycheck? What about those who get only unpaid vacation days and who can't therefore stockpile them for such an emergency? (Yes, those people do exist--and for a time I was one of them). Surely there is a better way to monitor paid leave, such as doctor's letters, insurance forms, whatever, to prove the need rather than just saying, "Oh people will abuse it; let's not do it."

The crowning glory on this poorly-written editorial, marked by rank snobbery, by people who obviously have never worked in a factory or plant or, in my case, a hospital is the last line: "Far worse than a job without generous benefits is no job at all." Only someone who has always had generous benefits and has no concept of the millions of people who live without them could write that and not feel like a complete pr*ck.

I think we ought to ask the editorial board about their own benefits and leave at the WSJ. Perhaps there are areas we could trim in advance of the publication's sale. You know, for reasons of profitability.